Waste thread collecting attachment for quiller



R. C. BYERS Oct. 18, 1955 WASTE THREAD COLLECTING ATTACHMENT FOR QUILLER 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 Filed Dec. 14, 1953 Oct. 18, 1955 R. c. BYERS 2,721,039

WASTE THREAD COLLECTING ATTACHMENT FOR QUILLER Filed Dec. 14, 1953 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 Ji Z United States Patent ice WASTE THREAD COLLECTING ATTACHMENT FOR QUILLER Ralph C. Byers, Laurens, S. C.

Application December 14, 1953, Serial No. 397,965

7 Claims. (Cl. 242-32) This invention relates to an attachment for use in connection with winding machines of the type known as quillers, one well known type of which is disclosed in United States Patents No. 2,395,028 and No. 2,160,810.

Machines of the character referred to wind yarn from yarn packages on to quills, the wound quills being thereafter placed in shuttles for use in weaving operations. The said machines comprise a multiplicity of units mounted to travel substantially horizontally along an endless path. Each unit comprises a support for a yarn package, a tensioning means, a driven rotative quill receiving and supporting means, and a thread guide mounted to reciprocate along a quill that is mounted in and rotated by the quill supporting means and which guide lays the thread in proper formation upon the rotating quill. When a fresh yarn package is placed upon a unit it becomes necessary to initially thread the yarn into proper relation to the quill support. In doing this the end portion of the thread is first threaded through the tensioning means, then carried to and through an eye of the traveling guide and the terminal end of the thread is then engaged with a retaining clip positioned adjacent the rotating quill. The thread is thus held in properly tensioned condition until the thread guide carries it into engagement with the quill which starts to wind the yarn upon itself. In this operation the end portion of the yarn which is held by the retaining clip is either broken or cut from the main strand and is left dangling as a waste end from the said clip.

The present invention consists of a simple and inexpensive attachment for quillers which serves to release these waste ends from the clips and conduct them to a bag or like receptacle from which they may be removed at the end of the days run. The waste ends come into being whenever a new yarn package is threaded into a unit or they may come into being when by breakage of the yarn rethreading becomes necessary. These waste ends do not come into being every time a quill is filled. Upon the contrary machines of the character described are so constructed that once the yarn is threaded as described it is automatically carried from quill to quill as said quills are filled and discharged from the machine, until all of the yarn in the package has been used.

Since the quillers proper are already well known in the art it will be understood that the present invention relates only to the waste thread retrieving and collecting means and not to the quiller proper. Enough of a conventional quiller has been illustrated in the accompanying drawings to disclose the relation of my invention thereto. However, the invention may be used in connection with quillers of a different nature than those referred to without departure from the invention.

In the accompanying drawings:

Fig. 1 is a side view of the parts constituting one of the traveling units of a standard quiller;

Fig. 2 is a vertical sectional view on line 22 of Fig. 1;

Fig. 3 is a side view of the retaining clip and its supporting bar;

2,721,039 Patented Oct. 18, 1955 Fig. 4 is a plan view of the clip and its supporting bar;

Fig. 5 is a transverse sectional View through the clip on line 55 of Fig. 3; and

Fig. 6 is a side view of the clip, its actuating cam and the open mouth conduit hereinafter described.

Like numerals designate corresponding parts in all of the figures of the drawings.

Each of the traveling units comprises an upright strip 5 having an out-turned foot 6 which constitutes a mounting for a disk 7 and spindle 8 upon which the yarn package 9 is mounted. Projecting outwardly from the face of strip 5 is a plate 10 upon which suitable tensioning devices are mounted. These may comprise the conventional idler pulleys having V-shaped peripheries with screws 11a for adjusting the two halves of the pulleys toward or from each other, but any suitable form of thread tensioner may be mounted on plate 10. The upper portion of strip 5 is connected to a wheeled carriage 12, said carriagetraveling on a trackway indicated at 13. The carriage constitutes a support for an electric motor 14 which motor drives a rotating spindle head 15 of cup formation that is mounted in bearing 16 and is adapted to receive the head end of the quill 17 to impart rotation. to said quill. The other end of the quill is mounted in an idler bearing 18. Bearings 16 and 18 are tied together by casting 19, said casting supporting a guide rod 20 along which a thread guide 21 is reciprocated by connections (not shown) from motor 14. The lower portions of the several strips 5 are tied together by a band 5a and the lower ends of the strips embrace and are guided by a trackway 5b.

The parts so far described are old and well known. In applying my attachment to this old machine 1 extend outwardly from each strip 5' a bar 22. An elongated bar has a yieldable retaining clip 23 mounted adjacent its outer end. These clips comprise body portions 24 of U-shape in cross-section, the flanges of the U embracing the sides of bar 22. Studs 25 project through opening 26 of the clips and are secured to the bar. Springs 27 bear between the outer faces of the clips and the heads 28 of the studs. Cam tails 29 of the clips are so shaped that when, in the bodily movement of arms 22 in their horizontal paths, said cam tails strike against a fixed cam surface 30 the clips will be thrust away from the faces. of bars 22 and against the tension of springs 27 to release the waste end portions of yarns as presently described. A base member 31 of the machine supports an upstanding post 32. A conduit comprising a horizontal run 33, a vertical downturned run 34 and a vertical upturned run 35, is secured to the face of post 32 by clamps 36 which embrace run 34. The lower end of run 34 extends into a collection receptacle such as bag 37. A tubular member 33 extends outwardly from the post and carries a fork 39 which straddles run 33 of the conduit to keep the conduit from swinging in the clamps 36. A rod 40 is telescopically mounted in member 38 and a set screw 41 provides means for adjusting rod 40 with respect to member 38. The fixed cam surface 30 which is contacted by cam tails 29 is formed upon the end of rod 40. In the initial threading of a unit the thread T from the yarn package is passed through eye 10a of plate 10 thence over the tensioning elements on said plate, to and through eye 21a of thread guide 21 and its terminal end is engaged beneath retaining clip 23. When in the normal operation of the machine the thread is carried to a point where the quill starts to wind the thread upon itself a short length is broken ofl? and left dangling as a waste end from the clip. Air from any suitable pressure source such as an air tank 45 and air pump 46 is discharged through a tube 47 longitudinally into the run 33 of the conduit and past the lower portion of the vertical run 35.

'quiller.

from this source one hundred percent and the features Downward air flow into theupper open end of said run is thereby induced. Thus when the waste threads are drawn acrossthe open end of-the conduit and there released,

the said threads are carried by said induced air flow and gravity down to the lower end of run'35 and blown thence along run 33 and down run 34 into collecting bag 37. An imp'ortant feature of the present invention. ,resides in the fact that the described arrangement mateand when these surplus ends show up in the finished fabric that piece of goods must be considered a second and be sold as such. The reason that these loose ends are prone to get wound upon the quillers along with the thread proper is that the bodily travelling quillers, of

, which there are quite a large number, travel, along with their supporting elements 5 and 12, at a high rate of speed, in a horizontal plane. Their movement sets up 'strong whirling currents of air which seize upon any loose or poorly secured waste ends. If these flying waste ends touch a revolving quiller they are immediately wound, into the thread that is being wound upon the The present invention has eliminated trouble which make it possible to secure the desired result include making the arms 22 long enough that the point at which the release of the waste yarn ends from the clips, takes place, is spaced away from the traveling supports 5 and-12 to a position where the swirling air currents are not so pronounced as they would be if the ends were released at a point closer to such supports. Further the clip 23 forcibly grips a relatively short waste end section directly between itself and the face of arm 22. The

'side flanges of the body portion of the U-shaped clip press the thread into contact with arm 22 and this provides a secure hold upon the thread even though a rela tively short end portion of the thread is involved. In some of the machines at present in use the thread ends are given several wraps around a small rod like arm and then the final end is pressed beneath a spring tongue upon the arm. With such an arrangement as that the length of thread represented by the wraps plus that engaged beneath the spring tongue, must be gotten rid of. My

' arrangement is much simpler, is more compact and keeps the waste ends short enough that they may be gotten rid of without undue interference by the whirling currents of air which exist about travelling quillers of the character described.

As far as I am aware I am the first to carry depending waste threads across an open mouthed conduit and there releasing them while maintaining an air flow as described in said conduit.

Since other ways may be resorted to to carry out this I basic thought it is to be understood that the invention is 'not limited to the precise construction set forth but that it includes within its purview whatever changes fairly fall within either the terms or the spirit of the appended claims.

I claim:

1. An attachment for collecting loose, waste ends 'of threadsin the operation of quilling machines of the type wherein a plurality of units each comprising a quill rotat ing means, a thread guide and a yarn package carrier are mounted for bodily travel along a determined path and wherein loose ends of the yarn threaded into the thread guides are left as waste after the yarn is engaged by the quills, said attachment comprising a plurality of substan tially horizontal arms mounted for bodily travel with the yarn package carriers and the quill rotating means, a yarn gripping clip mounted upon each of said horizontal arms,

. a fixed cam past which all of said arms move, a member said cam and be moved to release the said waste end,

a conduit having an upwardly'facing open mouth that is disposed below the path of travel of the said arms and over which open mouth the waste ends of yarn are drawn and means for creating downward suction at the open mouth of the conduit, such suction acting simultaneously with gravity to move the waste thread ends downwardly into the conduit when the thread is released by the action of the yarn gripping clip.

2. In a mechanism of the character described, a traveling arm, a yarn gripping clip mounted upon the arm, a suction conduit having an upwardly'facing open mouth over which the clip moves in the travel .of said arm and means for actuating said clip to release the yarn when it reaches a position approximatelyabove the open mouth of the conduit so that the released yarn end may be moved gravitationally and also by suction down into said conduit.

3. In a device of the character described a bodily traveling substantially horizontally disposed arm, a yarnv gripping clip mounted for rocking movement upon said arm, settable spring means tending to move the clip to thread engaging position upon its arm, a fixed suction conduit having a vertical run terminating immediately below the line of travel of the arm and clip, and presenting an open upper mouth across which loose thread ends held by said clip are drawn by the travel of the arm past said conduit anda fixed member said fixed member and clip having surfaces adapted to interengage by the travel of the clip past the fixed member and acting to rock the clip to other end of the bodyrun which terminates in an open upper mouth, a traveling arm which in its travel sweeps over the open mouth of the conduit, a yarn gripping clip mounted for movement upon the end of said arm, a fixed member past which said arm moves, interengaging means upon the fixed member and the clip acting to move the clip to yarn releasing position under the movement of the arm pastthe fixed member and an air pressure line discharging longitudinally into the body run of the conduit and across the lower portion of and away from the upturned end thereof to induce downward fiow'of air into the said open mouth and to positively blow material sucked into the said open mouth along the horizontal body run. Q

6. An attachment for collecting loose, waste ends of threads in the operation of quilling machines of the type i wherein a plurality of units each comprising a quill rotating means, a thread guide anda yarn package carrier are mounted for bodily travel along a determined path and wherein loose ends of the yarn threaded into the thread guides are left as waste after the yarn is engaged by the quills, said attachment comprising a plurality of elongated arms projecting laterally from, carried by and traveling bodily with the yarn package carriers and quill rotating means in a substantially horizontal plane, said arms being equal in number to the quill rotating units, there being one of said arms associated with each of said units, a clip mounted upon the outer end portion of each of said arms, said'clips comprising body portions and'cam tails projectingforwardly beyond the body portions, means mounting said body portionsfor'rocking movement upon the outer end portions of said arms, spring means urging the body portions into contact with said arms, a fixed cam 1 member disposed in the plane of all of said cam tails and against which said cam tails successively impinge to rock I the clips against the action of their respective springs to release the waste thread ends held by the clips, a suction ,conduit comprising a terminal upturned vertical end portion which presents an open upper mouth, said end portion being disposed at such position with respect to the line of travel of the waste thread ends held by the clips that said ends are drawn over the said open mouth of the conduit and the fixed cam being so positioned with respect to the upturned end of the conduit that the actuation of the clips to release the thread ends occurs when the threads have been moved to a position where they lie across the open mouth of the conduit.

7. A structure as recited in claim 6 wherein the body portions of the clips are of U-shape in cross section, the arms entering between the side members of said U-shaped portions and binding the waste thread ends along a plurality of faces of the rods until said threads are released by the clips.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS Colman Dec. 28, 1926 Kahlisch July 23, 1940 Esser Jan. 11, 1944 Schweiter Sept. 14, 1948 Borges July 28, 1953 Perry Nov. 17, 1953 FOREIGN PATENTS Great Britain May 14, 1952 

